Breivik, the 32-year-old Norwegian who has admitted to shooting dead 86 people and planting a bomb that killed seven others Friday, leased a farm in the municipality of Rena, about 160 kilometres (100 miles) north of Oslo, this spring.

In the small town, he brushed elbows with locals, including at a pub called the Cuckoo's Nest frequented by soldiers from the elite Telemark Battalion whose 2,000-strong base is in Rena.

Breivik said in a May 12 entry in his Internet-posted diary: "It's quite ironic being situated practically on top of the largest military base in the country. It would have saved me a lot of hassle if I could just 'borrow' a cup of sugar and 3kg of C4 (explosive) from my dear neighbor."

AFP - Getty Images

This undated image obtained on Saturday from Facebook shows Anders Behring Breivik, the 32-year-old suspect questioned by Norway's police over twin attacks on a youth camp and the government headquarters.

"He asked for a receipt and paid with cards -- nobody here asks for a receipt for a beer, and we just throw them away," said Hanne Skavern, 20, who works at the pub and some days at a petrol station.

Wrong wordsSvein Meldieseth, a burly 61-year farmer who made a deal with Breivik this spring to cut and buy the hay that grows at the leased farm in the village of Aasta, said Breivik appeared to be a "city man."

"He told me I could 'clip' it -- we say 'cut' in farming, so that tells a little about what he knew about farming," Meldieseth said.

Rena residents who talked to Reuters said they had only ever seen Breivik alone. He has told police he carried out the attacks alone.

Father: 'Shock'
On Sunday, Breivik's father said he was in shock and only learned of his son's involvement via online newspapers, a Norwegian daily said.

"I was reading the online newspapers and suddenly I saw his name and picture on the net,'' the father told the daily Verdens Gang of his son, Anders Behring Breivik. It said the man was interviewed "somewhere in France."

"It was a shock to learn about it. I have not recovered yet,'' he said. The man is a pensioner who lives in France and said he had had no contact with his son since 1995.

Breivik was arrested after Friday's massacre — mostly teens — on a tiny forested holiday island that was hosting a summer camp for the youth wing of Norway's ruling Labor party. Breivik was also charged in the bombing of Oslo's government district, which killed seven people hours earlier.

Bing / msnbc.com

'Rather introverted'
People who knew Breivik said he was quiet and intense.

"He was rather introverted at school, even though he was a good student," said Michael Tomola, who knew Breivik from the age of 13 to 16 at the school they went to in an Oslo suburb.

"I'm very surprised by this (attack). I had a good impression, although he became very engaged in subjects he cared for. He got very extreme about things he cared for," Tomola told Reuters.

The Facebook page set up last week included a variety of interests such as hunting and political and stock analysis. His tastes in music included classical and trance, a hypnotic form of dance music.

A Facebook profile for an Oslo man of that name and age was removed early Saturday. It included a profile photo identical to the one being used by Norwegian media. In the profile, he listed himself as "single," "Christian" and "conservative" and says he is director of Breivik Geofarm. It had listed interests including bodybuilding, conservative politics and freemasonry. The account had no posts.

Fringe group bars suspect
A fringe European anti-Islamist lobby group said Saturday Breivik had tried to join their Facebook group 18 months ago but had been rejected over his apparent neo-Nazi links.

Breivik said in an Internet posting in December 2009 he had had discussions with Stop Islamization of Europe, but the organization had no record of this, founder Anders Gravers said.

"He has never been in contact with us and he has never given us any advice," Gravers told Reuters.

But he said it was possible Breivik had attended one of its demonstrations.

He said an SIOE member in the Faroe Islands had checked Breivik's Facebook "friends" on the social media site when he tried to join and discovered one who used a picture of Danish neo-Nazi leader Jonni Hansen as his profile picture.

"He advised us not to allow this guy to join or be able to post on the Facebook wall (message page)," said SIOE co-founder Stephen Gash.

SOIE, which says it has 30,000 followers on Facebook, was founded by Gravers and Gash in 2007 with the aim of "preventing Islam becoming a dominant political force in Europe."

His turn to extremism
The Norwegian daily Verdens Gang quoted a friend as saying he became a right-wing extremist in his late 20s. It said he expressed strong nationalistic views in online debates and had been a strong opponent of multiculturalism.

Norwegian journalist Liss Goril Anda, writing for the BBC, said Breivik had left "racist, extremist right-wing comments along with fellow anti-Muslims" on the websites. She also said there were attempts to set up groups allied to the English Defence League in the U.K.

"These all represent, with varying degrees of extremism, a section of the Norwegian population which feels that the country's immigration policies are too lax," Goril Anda wrote. "They feel disenfranchised despite Norway's attempts at distributing fairly its immense oil wealth. Norway might now be forced to deal head-on with this undercurrent of nationalism and anti-immigration sentiments."

The authenticity of the online accounts could not immediately be verified, but government business records list a man of the same name and age as sole director of Breivik Geofarm.

In the records, the company says its business is the "growing of vegetables, melons, roots and tubers" and reports that it has 790 employees.

Bought fertilizer
A farm supply firm said Saturday that the suspect had bought 6 tons of fertilizer in May. Some kinds of agricultural fertilizer have been used in the past to make explosives.

The suspect placed the order through his company, the supplier said.

"It was 6 tons of fertilizer, which is a small, normal order for a standard agricultural producer," Oddny Estenstad, a spokeswoman at agricultural supply chain Felleskjoepet Agri, said.

Police were earlier reported to be trying to determine whether the farm could have provided the chemicals needed to build a large bomb like the one that exploded Friday in Oslo.

'Under the radar'Lasse Nordlie, owner of the Gjoekeredet Pub -- the Norwegian word for Cuckoo's Nest, a reference to a film starring Jack Nicholson as a patient in a psychiatric hospital -- said he did not remember seeing Breivik but said Rena was the perfect place for someone who wanted to avoid attention.

"It's easy to get under the radar here, and there's no view of the farm from the road," said Nordlie, age 34.

On a good Saturday night, Nordlie said, 150-200 soldiers from the Rena Camp drink at his pub, whose wall bears a banner from the NATO-led mission in Afghanistan and dance in the basement disco dubbed the Psych Ward Nightclub.

The bartenders in the nightclub, which is decorated with photographs Nordlie took at the abandoned Lier psychiatric hospital near Drammen, wear white doctor's coats.

"I am going to have to lie low with this psychiatric ward stuff for a while, maybe keep the disco shut for a while," Nordlie said.

Video: Motive emerges in Norway mass murder

Transcript of: Motive emerges in Norway mass murder

LESTER HOLT, anchor:The tears flowed freely in
Norway
today as a nation shocked and saddened by Friday's bombing and shooting massacre searched for comfort on a day of mourning. The death toll stands at 93, most of them kids, teenagers, trapped on a tiny island that a gunman turned into his personal killing ground. Rarely do we get into the mind of a confessed mass killer so soon after such a horror; tonight, however, the man who police say admits to the attacks is talking. But sadly, his words may only add further trauma to a hurting nation.
NBC
's
Martin Fletcher
has new details from
Oslo
tonight.
Martin
, good evening.

MARTIN FLETCHER reporting:Hi. Good evening,
Lester
. A chilling, racist picture of the confessed killer is emerging from his own writings. He wrote that he wanted to bring about a revolution that would end the centuries old Muslim colonization of
Europe.
United in grief.

Mr. JENS STOLTENBERG:

FLETCHER:Norway
's prime minister called Friday's bomb and shooting attacks a national tragedy.

Unidentified Woman:

FLETCHER:In
Oslo
's 17th century cathedral today,
King Harald
and
Queen Sonja
cried with their people.
Ninety-three
victims, including about 80 teenagers, sacrificed to one man's obsession to transform society. His weapon: mass killing. Charged with terrorism, tomorrow
Anders Breivik
will be arraigned in court. His lawyer said he wants to explain, but he already laid it all out on the
Internet
. Friday,
Breivik
posted a chilling
1500
-page manifesto, which he says took him years to write, with chunks of it lifted from writings by the
Unabomber
. In the very first sentence, he wrote, "It is better to kill too many than not enough." Later, "We do not want to do this, but we're left with no choice." And finally, "I believe this will be my last entry. It is now Friday,
July 22nd
." Within hours,
Breivik
killed seven in
Oslo
and at least another 86 on the island.

Mr. ARSHAD ALI (Survivor):To my mom, I said there's a shooting on the island. I don't -- I don't know what's going on.
And I
love you. I think I said, I don't know if I will see you again, but at least I love you.

FLETCHER:The search continued today for bodies, little hope that any of the missing will be found alive. Police also searching the island for signs of a possible second shooter.

Mr. SVEINUNG SPONHEIM (Acting Oslo Chief of Police):He said -- says that he was acting alone, but we have to make sure that that's true.

FLETCHER:NBC
's
Jay Gray
spoke exclusively to
Breivik
's lawyer.

Mr. GEIR LIPPESTAD (Anders Breivik's Attorney):He believes in a revolution. And he believes that the only way he can make revolution is through violence.

JAY GRAY reporting:Does he feel as if he's accomplished his goal?

Mr. LIPPESTAD:Well, it's difficult to understand, of course, but in his head, he takes pride in this. Yes.

FLETCHER:Breivik
's goal, to stop Muslims from emigrating to
Europe
, to end European attempts to have different peoples live side-by-side, what they call multiculturalism. Growing numbers across
Europe
agree.
Right-wing
parties are becoming more powerful.
Iver Neumann
is no right-winger, but facts are facts.

Mr. IVER NEUMANN (Norwegian Institute of International Affairs):I grew up in a lily
white society
. Now every fourth person in
Oslo
is born of a non-Western parentage. That is a lot of change in a relatively small number of years.

FLETCHER:In
Norway
,
Islam
is the second religion now. Most Muslims are recent immigrants and happy to be here.

Unidentified Man:And we live in peace and love now here, this country, and we love
Norway
.

FLETCHER:Breivik
called his manifesto a European declaration of independence. He wrote that the massacre would serve as a tool to market his manifesto, a confessed killer with a message.
Lester
:

Under heavily armed police guard, Anders Behring Breivik (left, in red T-shirt) is taken back to Utoya on August 13 to reconstruct his actions during a shooting spree on the island. Breivik is charged with killing 69 people who were attending a summer camp at the lake island after killing another eight people in Oslo with a bomb.
(Trond Solberg / VG - Scanpix Norway via Sipa)
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Breivik travels with police officers on the ferry to Utoya island on August 13. The 32-year-old Breivik described the shootings in close detail during an eight-hour tour on the island, prosecutor Paal-Fredrik Hjort Kraby told a news conference.
(Trond Solberg / VG - Scanpix Norway via Sipa)
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Relatives and friends of the Norway attack victim Tamta Liparteliani gather near a coffin during a funeral in Kutaisi, western Georgia, on August 6. Tamta, a Georgian student, was one of the victims on Utoya island.
(Shakh Aivazov / AP)
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Norway Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg comforts a relative of Mona Abdninur, 18, during her funeral ceremony in Hoeybraeten, near Oslo, on August 2. Abdninur was one of the 77 people killed by Anders Behring Breivik.
(Stoyan Nenov / Reuters)
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A close friend of Bano Rashid, one of the victims of the massacre on the youth camp of the Norwegian Labour Party, walks ahead of her coffin carrying her portrait as they make their way to her gravesite at Nesodden Kirke, south of Oslo on July 29.
(Odd Andersen / AFP - Getty Images)
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A mourner weeps during the funeral service for Bano Abobakar Rashid at a church in Nesodden, near Oslo, on July 29. Rashid, whose family fled to Norway from Iran in 1996, was one of the victims on Utoya island, where gunman Anders Behring Breivik killed at least 68 people, exactly one week ago.
(Lefteris Pitarakis / AP)
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People pay their respects for the victims in last Friday's killing spree and bomb attack, at a temporary memorial site on the shore in front of Utoya island northwest of Oslo on Wednesday.
(Fabrizio Bensch / Reuters)
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A family drops red roses from their boat into the sea, close to Utoya island, near Oslo, Norway, on July 26.
(Ferdinand Ostrop / AP)
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A sea of flowers and lit candles are placed in memory of those killed in Friday's bomb and shooting attack in front of Oslo Cathedral on Monday, July 25. Hundreds of thousands of Norwegians packed city centres across the country to pay tribute to the 76 people killed in twin attacks last week. Picture taken with fish-eye lens.
(Fabrizio Bensch / Reuters)
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People comfort each other outside Oslo City Hall as they participate in a "rose march" in memory of the victims of Friday's bomb attack and shooting massacre on Monday, July 25.
(Aas, Erlend / AP)
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People gather outside Oslo City Hall to participate in a "rose march" in memory of the victims of Friday's bomb attack and shooting massacre in Norway, Monday.
(Emilio Morenatti / AP)
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Elizabeth Amundsen holds a rose and cries as thousands of people gather at a memorial vigil following Friday's twin extremist attacks on Monday in Oslo, Norway.
(Paula Bronstein / Getty Images)
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Anders Behring Breivik, left, the man accused of a killing spree and bomb attack in Norway, sits in the rear of a vehicle as he is transported in a police convoy leaving the courthouse in Oslo on July 25. A judge ordered eight weeks detention for Breivik.
(Jon-Are Berg-Jacobsen / Aftenposten - Scanpix Norway via Reuters)
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People stand outside the courthouse where Anders Behring Breivik is due to appear in Oslo on July 25.
(Cathal McNaughton / Reuters)
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A couple react as they pay their respects at a sea of floral tributes for the victims of Friday's attacks, outside the cathedral of Oslo on July 25.
(Cathal McNaughton / Reuters)
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People, including relatives of a victim in the center of the picture, gather to observe a minute's silence on a campsite jetty on the Norwegian mainland, across the water from Utoya island, on July 25. People have been placing floral tributes in memory of those killed in the shooting massacre.
(Matt Dunham / AP)
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People stand in front of the Domkirke church in central Oslo on July 25. The bombing of government buildings in Oslo and the subsequent shooting spree at a political youth camp on Utoya island on 22 July have claimed more than 90 lives with the death toll still feared to rise.
(Joerg Carstensen / EPA)
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French police officers work around the house of Jens Breivik, the father of Anders Behring Breivik, in Cournanel, southern France, on July 25. Anders Behring Breivik is reported to have admitted to Friday's shootings at a youth camp and a bomb that killed seven people in Oslo's government district, but to have denied any criminal guilt.
(Bob Edme / AP)
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Norwegian Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg, left, hugs Queen Sonja as King Harald, right, looks on outside a government building in Oslo on July 24.
(Wolfgang Rattay / Reuters)
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Three roses float in Tyrifjord Lake near a makeshift memorial for the victims of the massacre on Utoya island on July 24.
(Britta Pedersen / EPA)
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Rescue personnel continue in their search for the missing in Tyrifjor lake, just off Utoya island July 24.
(Fabrizio Bensch / Reuters)
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Survivors and relatives of a shooting rampage on the Utoya island mourn following a memorial service in the Oslo cathedral July 24.
(Wolfgang Rattay / Reuters)
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German Marcel Gleffe stands on Utvika camping ground in front of Utoya Island, Norway, July 24. According to news sources, Gleffe, who has a military background, saved up to 30 youths from the Utoya island shooting. Reports state that he was on holiday with his family at a campground across the water from Utoya when he heard the gunfire. He and others reportedly jumped into boats and began ferrying people escaping the island to safety.
(Britta Pedersen / EPA)
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Adrian Pracon, one of the survivors of the Utoya island massacre, speaks from his bed at Ringerike hospital on July 24. He pretended to be dead, and was able to survive with a gunshot wound in his shoulder.
(Steinar Schjetne / EPA)
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A combination of images shows Anders Behring Breivik, the man identified by Norwegian police as the gunman and alleged bomber behind the attack on government buidlings and the Labour party youth camp in Oslo on July 22 . Breivik told police he acted alone in the attack he had planned over many months.
(Facebook / YouTube / AFP - Getty Images)
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Utoya island, located 40 kilometers southwest of Oslo, is seen in the background as people light candles on July 23, in memory of the victims of the July 22 shooting spree on the island.
(Jonathan Nackstrand / AFP - Getty Images)
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Members of the police and army carry out searches on a farm rented by Anders Behring Breivik in the small rural region of Rena, 93 miles north of Oslo, July 23. Breivik was arrested after Friday's massacre of young people on a tiny forested holiday island that was hosting the annual summer camp for the youth wing of Norway's ruling Labour party. The 32-year-old Norwegian was also charged for the bombing of Oslo's government district that killed seven people hours earlier.
(Cathal McNaughton / Reuters)
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Family members and survivors react as Norwegian King Harald and Queen Sonja (not seen) arrive to comfort them outside a hotel northwest of Oslo July 23.
(Fabrizio Bensch / Reuters)
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A boat of rescue services is seen near the bodies of victims covered with white blankets resting at the shore of Utoya island following a July 22 shooting spree at the island, west of the capital Oslo, Norway, July 23.
(Kristoffer Oeverli Andersen / EPA)
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The shattered windows of a government building are seen on July 23 in Oslo, following Friday's bombing.
(Vegard Grott / Scanpix Norway via Reuters)
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People gather outside the Oslo Cathedral to mourn and show their respect for the victims of the July 22 shooting at a Norwegian Labour Youth League camp, July 23.
(Jan Johannessen / AFP - Getty Images)
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People embrace inside a hotel where relatives of victims and survivors of the shooting which took place at a meeting of the youth wing of Norway's ruling Labour Party on Utoya island gather in Sundvollen on Friday.
(Fabrizio Bensch / Reuters)
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Emergency services are seen on Utoya island searching for the missing after a shooting took place at a meeting of the youth wing of Norway's ruling Labour Party on Friday.
(Str / Reuters)
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A wounded woman is brought ashore opposite Utoya island after being rescued from a gunman who went on a killing rampage targeting participants in a Norwegian Labour Party youth organisation event on the island on Friday.
(Svein Gustav Wilhelmsen / AFP - Getty Images)
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A SWAT team aim their weapons while people take cover during a shoot out at Utoya island, some 40 km south west of the capital Oslo on Friday.
(Jan Bjerkeli / AFP - Getty Images)
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An aerial view of Utoya Island taken July 21. A gunman opened fire on youths at a camp on the island, killing at least nine. Police arrested a suspect, a Norwegian, and said he was linked to the bomb blast in Oslo.
(Lasse Tur / AP)
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Still images taken from surveillance camera footage show the moment the bomb blast struck the Digital Impuls store in Oslo on Friday July 22, as glass shatters and people run out of the store.
(Reuters Tv / Reuters)
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Smoke pours from a building in the center of Oslo, Norway, on Friday, July 22, after an explosion that damaged several buildings, including the prime minister's office, shattering windows and covering the street with documents. The bombing was linked to a nearly simultaneous attack on a youth camp northwest of Olso in which a man dressed as a policeman opened fire on young people.
(Thomas Winje ØIjord / AP)
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An injured woman is helped by a man at the scene of the explosion. The blast damaged government buildings in central Oslo, including Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg's office.
(Scanpix Norway / Reuters)
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Editor's note:
This image contains graphic content that some viewers may find disturbing.